With Friends Like These
by KCS
Summary: A response fic, dedicated to all my wonderful fellow-writers who joined forces recently to bring me out of a very rough few weeks. Many, many thanks to all of you!
1. Chapter 1

_I would like to thank my co-author, Protector of the Gray Fortress, for spearheading a widespread effort to make my day brighter last week and to bring me out of a very serious depression and case of writer's block that had lasted probably three weeks at least._

_And, I would like to express my gratitude to all of you (I believe the final count was 13) fellow writers who contributed to the effort. I was astounded and floored by all of your responses, and I promise you I don't take the effort and time you each spent in making me feel better at all lightly. Thank you very, very much, and if you ever want me to return the favour please do not hesitate to ask._

_That being said, this is for all of you. Was going to be a oneshot, but...when you broke up the writer's block you scared my muse into running away with me, so it'll be a few chapters probably._ :)

* * *

According to my calculations, the nap of our sitting room carpet contains seventy-three or seventy-four fibres to the square inch, or roughly eight hundred seventy-six or eight hundred eighty eight fibres to the square foot. As the carpeting in the room is vaguely in the vicinity of sixty feet square, minus the hearth and the burnt spot under the chemical table, this equals out to somewhere around fifty-two thousand, five hundred sixty or fifty-three thousand, two hundred eighty, give or take a few dozen odd fibres.

Not that this interesting, though completely irrelevant, fact had any magnitude at the moment.

Perhaps if I turned my attentions to calculating the number of words on the pages of the _Times_ I had scattered round my couch. Averaging seven words a sentence, four and one-half sentences to a paragraph, and taking into consideration the brevity of certain articles and the verbosity of others, together with the larger print of certain headers and sub-headers…

I cannot say I was overly disappointed when the sound of the doorknob slamming into the wall-plaster jolted my calculations off and I lost count on the third spread.

Watson had apparently been to see a wealthy patient all the way in Westminster, then to a stationer's, a druggist's, and then either to the Bow Street post office or the bookstore just round the corner from it; I could not tell from here the exact shade of the mud upon the inseam of his trousers and completely lacked the energy or interest to discover it for myself.

The cause of the vehement door-slamming was probably not any of those events, however, but rather the fact that in his excursions he either had refused to take a cab or had been unable to. Judging from the fact that his coat and hat were not merely wet but sopping (and that he suddenly sneezed with enough force that I heard the portrait of Lucretia Borgia that adorned my east bedroom wall rattling loudly), he had neglected to take an umbrella and therefore the probability lay in favour of his not being able to find a hansom between Bow Street and Baker Street, quite a distance to walk in the rain. He was about rather early today; the mantel clock read only sixteen minutes past eight. He must have gone out early whilst I had been asleep.

I barely noticed when he poured himself a hot drink and then vanished upstairs without a word, no doubt to change into less damp attire.

A few minutes – or was it longer? Fifteen, twenty, thirty? – later he returned, _sans_ dripping clothing and bad temper. Good, I had no time or patience to deal with anyone's black mood but my own at the moment.

A tiny voice of conscience, squashed and smothered under a dank cloud of reason and justification, informed me that I was being incredibly selfish. I frowned and rejected the thought, banishing it into the outer darkness curling round my brain and noting with interest how much easier it became to smother the conscience, the more one did it…like water flowing over stones, eventually wearing the resistance down into a cold, polished smoothness.

"You know, your muscles will begin to tend toward atrophy if you remain on that couch for the duration of yet another day," I vaguely heard my friend's mild remonstrance from somewhere across the room.

Watson is a good fellow, but entirely too concerned with others. On the best of days, that quality is fascinatingly endearing. However, in a time like this, it is no less than infuriatingly annoying and I told him so in no uncertain terms, ignoring the slightly hurt look that flashed across his expressive face before he sat at his desk and opened a journal and a fresh inkwell (obviously the fruits of his visit to the stationer's) – scribbling out yet another floridly embellished memoir, no doubt.

That was all the world needed at the moment. Another step-by-step, play-by-play account of my methods and procedures, so that every literate criminal in the city's populace would grow even more wary and unadventurous, not daring to test their wits and mettle against my superiour steel.

Every criminal. Bah, sometimes (like this time) I wondered if I had not succeeded in singlehandedly driving out every criminal in London who had been anywhere within reach of my mental abilities. Did no one dare to tax my mind with a crime of import or note? Even the Continent had been far too quiet of late; this spring weather had brought with it only daffodils and warm showers and utter laziness on the part of the entire illicit populace in this hemisphere of the globe.

Fifteen minutes or an hour later the scritch-scratching of Watson's nib was growing positively maddening. And his blasted sniffling, which was growing worse as the minutes passed by. I decided to attack the scratching first, as it could be changed with the most ease.

"Honestly, Watson, can you not use a blunt pen instead of that confounded sharp nib?" I demanded; surely a writer would have more than one instrument on hand and at least one that could not double for a mental torture device!

"I always write the final draft of a manuscript with a fine point," his voice drifted over the couch to me.

"Then write it some other time, for the love of heaven!"

He sighed (rather over-dramatically, I might add) and closed the book, corking the ink-bottle and turning to fix me with a disapproving look that I had by now gotten thoroughly used to and that no longer bothered me in the least.

"Holmes, do you not have an experiment you could be working on? Updating your index? Practicing that new Chopin piece you got the score to last week?"

"You know full well the Bunsen burner has not yet been replaced since my experiment with the coal-dust in the Piccadilly Circle beggar case. Nothing of note has happened in the last fortnight to be worth the price of paste and the space in the index. And I do not feel like playing my Stradivarius."

I did not feel like doing _anything_, even moving an eyelid or breathing, but there was no sense in telling a medical man (especially _that_ medical man) that. Why could he not take the infernal story-book upstairs so that I could escape this depression's clutches for a few hours via the only thing so far I had found that would take me above the black clouds? It was not out of any great love for Watson that I had not indulged myself already this morning, but merely that I had no desire to hear his traditional hour-long dissertation on the degeneration of brain cells and other medical claptrap.

But some Fate, kind or evil, had apparently heard my mental request, for the man in question pocketed his journal with another jarring sneeze and trudged out of the room without looking back at me. He did not need to look, as I had not moved from this position in over eight hours…or was it longer? No matter, I was moving now. Two steps to the mantel to reach for the syringe and cocaine-bottle, two steps back to the settee.

Now for it…

Blast. Only seconds away from escape, and the doorbell's infernally noisy jangling had completely broken my thoughts. I debated whether to continue but decided against it in the faint, somewhat hopeless whim that it might be a possible client at the door.

I should have even welcomed a crazed, vendetta-bent escaped convict after my blood at this point in the depression and lethargy that had swamped me in its murky hold for over two weeks now.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, I supposed) it was not an escaped inmate but a man who was rather adept at pushing me to be a candidate for Bedlam myself who appeared in the doorway behind Mrs. Hudson.

"Inspector Lestrade, what brings you out on such a morning? Nothing trivial, I hope?"

The man's little ferret eyes were gleaming at me with an excitement that either spelled a rather interesting case or merely something he wished to gloat over. For his sake, I hoped it was the former, or he would be making very personal and close contact with the front door in short order.

He seated himself without asking in Watson's armchair (I quashed a ridiculous flare of anger at his touching it) and shook a bit of water from his bowler before placing it before the fire to dry.

"How are you, Mr. Holmes?"

"You may dispense with the pleasantries, Lestrade, and tell me why you've come here so soon after fishing a body out of the Thames near the Victoria Embankment."

I do never tire of seeing unsuspecting people's eyes widen in that peculiar manner that signifies astonishment at a very simplistic deduction.

"How did you know that, Mr. Holmes?" the little official gasped, staring at me as if he had not seen me do this sort of thing dozens of times.

I sighed wearily, shoving the cocaine-bottle under the couch with my slippered foot before the man saw it; not that the man was perceptive enough to anyway, but it was better to be safe than have to scramble for an explanation that was likely to be embarrassing at best.

"Your cuffs are soaked with muddy silt, Lestrade, though your jacket sleeves are clean, and there is a large damp patch upon your left knee; you have been kneeling on wet ground, and while most places in London are damp I doubt you would be doing so in the middle of the street. Obviously you've been fishing about in water, Thames water from the texture and filth of your cuffs, and I doubt your police duties include catching trout. A body is involved, then, and it is attempted murder at the very least, else you would not have been called out to see it yourself in the first place nor would you have come round to me instead of home for dry clothes.

I am aware that you are the first man on call this early in the day at the Yard; it is barely a quarter of nine. Victoria Embankment is no very great distance from Scotland Yard, and as your boots are spotless though your clothing is not, I conclude that you were able to return to your office to clean your footwear up a bit before taking a cab here, all within a half-hour of your coming on duty. Where else could you have been fishing a corpse out of the Thames and still arrived here by this time?"

"Wonderful, Mr. Holmes!" the official cried enthusiastically.

I shook my head, despairing of ever teaching these official forces the value of cold, precise logic. "Commonplace, Lestrade. Now, what is it about this body that brings you to see me instead of home for a dry shirt?"

I had been half-expecting Watson to pop into the room to see if the visitor was a client, but apparently he was either too irritated with me or too engrossed in his writing to bother with my cases at the moment. That suited me perfectly fine, for I wanted to be left alone anyway, and as Lestrade did not broach the subject of the Doctor's absence I was not about to. Now if I could just get rid of this Inspector in short order…

"I'd like for you to take a look at the body, Mr. Holmes. Mr. Holmes?"

I realised the man was speaking only when he repeated the statement twice. But unless the affair were something out of the ordinary (I had seen quite enough over the years of drowned corpses fished out of the Thames by the water police, thank you very much) I had no intention of leaving a warm house and my comfortable depression into a disgustingly cheerful spring morning (the sun was now starting to peep warily out from the cloud cover, casting a long slant of light through the cracked blinds).

"Something unusual about the fellow, Lestrade?"

"Quite," the man intoned solemnly, his beady eyes glinting with puzzled intrigue.

"What then?" I asked slowly through clenched teeth – for heaven's sake, could the man not simply tell me what he wanted instead of this roundabout way of giving the facts, if they were even facts? His beating around the bush was even worse than Watson's storytelling.

"Just that, Mr. Holmes, this fellow apparently was killed before he was drowned."

"That is nothing overtly unusual, Inspector; men are murdered on a daily basis in this metropolis and the Thames more often than not is merely a means of effectively destroying the evidence. Many men have been killed before being dumped into the river," I said in annoyance.

"By both shooting, stabbing, strangulation, _and_ poisoning?"

I blinked and sat up on the couch, the afghan falling carelessly into a pile on the carpet.

"Now I will concede that that is a bit off the beaten track, Lestrade."

"That's not the reason I want you to look at him, though, Mr. Holmes."

"Why then?" I asked curiously, my interest slowly, very slowly, starting to spark again, like the first car in a train beginning to pull on the rest of the line, unable to yet get completely moving but no doubt would be pulling out of the station momentarily.

"His pockets were empty save for one thing," Lestrade replied, reaching into his own pocket to retrieve the item. "This. A small card-case, filled with plain white, simple calling cards. But all of them bearing the name _'Mr. Sherlock Holmes'_ and the address _'221B Baker Street, London'_. How would you like to go about explaining that interesting fact, Mr. Holmes?"

* * *

_To be continued..._


	2. Chapter 2

"Inspector, I assure you if _I_ had murdered a man, I wouldn't dump his body into the Thames with my calling cards in his pocket."

"I wasn't insinuating that you'd killed the poor devil, Mr. Holmes," the little official backpedaled with a haste I found thoroughly amusing; it was such _fun_ to see those Yarders squirm under a superiour brain! "I just thought you perhaps would like to know that someone in this capital wants your attention…either that or this fellow broke in here and stole your card-case, one or the other."

I rose from the sofa for only the fourth time in the last twenty-four hours, haphazardly tying the belt of my dressing gown, and went to fish about in my overcoat pocket, soon procuring my own card-case. Intact.

"None of my cards are missing, Lestrade," I reported the obvious in case the official were unable to perceive that fact for himself (which was actually more than likely), and tossed the case to the man for his own inspection.

"So it seems. But the case and cards are very similar," he replied thoughtfully, tapping a finger against the black leather. "It's an odd business, Mr. Holmes."

"That is definitely a word for it. I am far more interested in who wanted the man dead so badly that they were taking no chances in the matter." I threw the words over my shoulder as I rushed into my bedroom, digging about for a clean collar and tie...where the devil had Mrs. Hudson put them? "Give me ten minutes, Inspector, and I shall be entirely at your disposal."

Three-quarters of an hour later, I was following Inspector Lestrade through the heavy doors of the Scotland Yard morgue, feeling the cold stillness of death enveloping us in its chilling aura as we entered. Though a bit macabre, a morgue was an excellent starting point for anyone who wished to get into this investigating business – if the horror did not turn the man's stomach, he was more than suited for the job.

My interesting thoughts were shattered as behind me Watson, who had finally been good enough to grace us with his presence and tag along, let out a loud sneeze that made Lestrade jump nearly out of his skin (in a manner reminiscent of my brother's pet rabbit when I used to experiment upon him as a child) as the echo reverberated off the walls of the abysmal place.

"Sorry," he murmured guiltily when I laughed and Lestrade glared at both of us.

"Catching cold, Doctor?"

"I'm afraid I got caught out in one too many rainstorms," he replied with a stifled cough.

The official nodded sympathetically. "Half the force has been down with something or other in the last month. I don't mind telling you, gentlemen, I'm a sight glad that I'm not out pounding a beat in weather like this. Ah, here we are, Mr. Holmes." The Inspector pulled the sheet back from the body in question and indicated the corpse with a macabre flourish that I found in extreme bad taste.

"Good Lord…" I heard Watson's disgusted murmur as he glanced over my shoulder, sniffing annoyingly in my ear.

"Quite. Nasty business, and I've seen a few in my day," Lestrade said with a grimace. He let go of the dingy sheet and moved to pick up a clipboard from a nearby table, handing it to Watson. He barely glanced over it and in turn passed it on to me.

"No water in the lungs. Actual cause of death, one bullet to the heart," I read, glancing quizzically at the body.

"Death would have been instantaneous, in that case – why then the stab wound?" Watson asked, indicating a gash above the bullet's entrance hole.

"Don't forget the poison, Doctor."

Watson turned to fix upon the Inspector. "What poison? The man shows no visible sign of being poisoned."

"According to this," I waved the report at him, "his stomach was full of enough strychnine to dispatch a horse with ease."

"But strychnine kills within a half-hour at most, and has very distinct and visible symptoms such as tetanus within a quarter of an hour," he replied, his eyes lighting up with interest. "That means the man was shot only minutes after ingesting the poison."

I nodded, moving to look over the body myself. "Lestrade, I thought you said the man had also been strangled."

"Well, you see the bruising and the scratches on his throat, don't you?"

"Yes, but that was obviously caused by a woman's hand, and a small one," Watson replied before I could. "I doubt that such a small woman would be able to even exert much pressure over such a large man, certainly not enough to come anywhere near closing his windpipe. Looks more like an angry attack, maybe even in self-defense, than any actual murderous intent."

Lestrade flushed uncomfortably. "Well, I was trying to appeal to your interests, Mr. Holmes, so…"

"You exaggerated, yes, yes, Lestrade," I replied dryly, waving the man's infernal blathering off with one hand. "According to this, the time of death could have been anywhere in the last forty-eight hours?"

"Difficult to pinpoint it with the Thames as swollen as it is, and with the effects of the water on the body," Watson offered, burying his nose in a handkerchief and venting a muffled sneeze.

"Bless you, Doctor."

"Have you identified the body yet, Lestrade?"

"No, Mr. Holmes, his clothes were unmarked – even the shop labels had been cut out of them."

Strange. "And the only thing he carried on his person was a card-case full of cards that are not mine but purport to be. I would like to see the clothing, Lestrade."

"Right over here, Mr. Holmes; I had the lot sent back down here once it was dry…or mostly so, anyway."

"So, in order of occurrence, someone slipped this fellow a heavy dose of strychnine, and not ten minutes later he gets a bullet to the heart. Then _after_ that, he's stabbed between the fourth and fifth left rib?" Watson asked bemusedly, looking at me for an explanation.

"It appears so. But…something about this bothers me, Watson." I picked up the clipboard once more and read the report more carefully this time from beginning to end. Everything appeared in order and matched the corpse in every respect, but still…something was wrong with this. Something was just fishy about the entire business, and I did not mean the connection to the Thames.

And not just the fact that the only clue on the body was my calling card. That was an _extra_ bit to brighten up my day. Oh, _lovely_.

"Here you are, Mr. Holmes, though I think even your powers will come up against a wall with this mess," Lestrade sighed, dumping a still-damp wool jacket, a rough woolen checked shirt, a pair of rough work boots and sodden black socks, and a pair of brown trousers upon the table, none of which matched any other of the articles of clothing.

Ten minutes later, Watson took an inordinate pleasure in pointing out that Lestrade had been right – even my powers of deduction could perceive nothing useful from clothing nearly disintegrated in the swollen, filthy Thames, with all labels cut from said clothing. I could deduce absolutely nothing about the man that would further our investigation.

But Lestrade and Watson need not have been so perfectly _jubilant_ about the fact of my failure!

I took a mean pleasure in seeing Watson sneeze again, so loudly that his face flushed in embarrassment and Lestrade jumped for the second time, dropping the clipboard I had handed him in his startlement.

"My apologies, Inspector…"

"Quite all right, Doctor. Mr. Holmes, is there anything else you wish to see here?"

"Nothing, Lestrade. Tell me how you found the body, exactly," I replied, casting a last glance at the man's corpse before we began to exit the morgue for a more lively, if less intelligent, place in the Yard's office wing.

"I got the call within my first ten minutes," Lestrade explained, shutting the heavy door behind us with a metallic clang. "Water police had found him floating in the river a few hundred yards beyond the Embankment and sent the call in. I got there just in time to help fish the blighter out...and I don't mind tellin' you, Mr. Holmes, it was a gruesome sight."

"How soon do you think you'll get an identification?"

"I've no idea, Mr. Holmes…I was rather hoping you'd be able to help us, seeing as the poor devil was carrying your calling cards."

"A potential client of yours, perhaps, Holmes?" Watson asked.

I shook my head. "If so, he should have been much more careful of the company he kept before coming to me. Most people who engage my assistance for preventing their murders do not wait until they have enough enemies to be shot, stabbed, _and_ poisoned."

"Perhaps the body was a warning to you, then?" Lestrade offered, unlocking his office and gesturing for me to precede him inside.

I sat on an uncomfortable wooden chair amid a pile of paperwork and old teacups and Watson leant against the wall beside me. "If so, what would the warning be for?" I pointed out sensibly. "I've no case on hand, and I have not had for weeks now. Warning me from what?"

"Do you have any particular enemies at the moment, Mr. Holmes?"

"Not beyond the usual fraction of the populace. And most of those would sooner knife me in an alley than go to the trouble of an elaborate warning such as this. Why draw my attention in so _outré_ a manner?"

"Has anyone been recently released or escaped from prison that might hold a grudge against you, Holmes?"

"If so, I've not seen it in the papers, Watson – and heaven knows they have been my sole source of reading material for the last fortnight," I grumbled, slouching in my chair and staring at the floor. My word, Lestrade really did need to sweep in here, the dust was simply atrocious under that desk…

This made absolutely no logical sense whatsoever. How could I track down a man with unmarked clothing and the body too distorted by water and violence to be beyond any real help in discovering his secrets?

Watson sneezed once again, in the close vicinity of my ear, and I glanced up at him in annoyance. He blushed in embarrassment, shuffling a step away, and opened his mouth to apologise. But before he could do so there was a sharp rat-a-tat on the office door.

"Would you get that, Dr. Watson?" Lestrade requested absently, rummaging through a drawer for heaven only knew what – his last clean teacup, most likely, judging from the amount of used ones scattered round the small office.

My friend turned and opened the door. Lestrade's sharpest subordinate, P.C. Randall Cummings, paused in surprise with his hand mid-salute.

"Oh, g'morning, Doctor."

"Good morning, Cummings. How is the little one's earache this morning?"

"Much better now, Doctor," the young fellow replied gratefully. "Those drops you gave him did the trick right enough. I'm awfully grateful to you, sir; the wife was fair at her wits' end with the lad these last three days."

"Not at all. Now if the symptoms worsen in the next twenty-four hours, make sure to call me back at once."

"Aye, sir, I'll do that. Alice was saying just this morning, that –"

"What _is_ it, Cummings?" Lestrade interrupted with a sigh and a roll of the eyes in my direction as if to say _be lucky you get to choose whom you work with_.

"Oh, Inspector," the hapless constable stammered. "We – we've got another, sir."

"Another body?" Lestrade moaned and slumped back into his chair. "I've not got the report fully filled out on the one this morning!"

"Not another body, Inspector," Cummings reported, instantly snapping back into his professional role finally.

"Another _what_ then? Come on, man, out with it!"

I have remarked before how such a little man can bellow louder than any actor of my acquaintance; his subordinates lived continually in fear of a dressing-down, courtesy of the best of the professionals.

Granted, best of _nothing_ was merely a little better than nothing, but that was beside the point at the moment…

Cummings shot me an apprehensive look before turning his eyes back to the sheaf of papers in his hands. "There's been a purse-snatching on Swindon Street, sir. The chap got lost in the crowd, according to Constable MacPherson's report, but they retrieved the woman's purse in a nearby wastebin. It'd been emptied of everything except a black leather card-case containing six calling cards."

I suddenly had a crawling feeling slithering down the back of my neck that told me I did not really want to know whose name was printed upon those cards.

Lestrade's beady eyes darkened with an eager sheen. "Whose name, Cummings?"

Cummings gulped nervously. "Mr. Holmes's. Beggin' your pardon, sir."

* * *

_To be continued..._


	3. Chapter 3

The mental picture of a large white newspaper with the stark black headline, _Famous Detective Steals Purse from Elderly Woman_, was (oddly enough) the first thing that flashed through my mind upon Cummings's pronouncement. I nearly laughed at the thought, but I subsided once I realised how serious indeed this might be to my reputation if word were to get out. Tabloid gossip was ruthless and it only took one rumour to perform permanent damage to a man's character.

"Cummings, who knows about this latest development?" Lestrade demanded, glancing out the door to ensure no one was listening and then shutting it once more.

"Just MacPherson, 's far as I know, Inspector," the officer replied hastily.

"Thank heaven for small favours," Lestrade muttered, sinking back down in his chair. He placed his elbows on the polished desktop and glanced over helplessly at me.

"You surely don't think I had anything to do with that, either?"

"Of course not, Mr. Holmes, but you have to admit this is rather out of the ordinary, and something has to be done about it. These things have a way of getting out despite all police security, and once it hits the papers…"

"You can say goodbye to your spotless career, probably," Watson finished helpfully.

I glared at him, and he merely blinked placidly back at me. Hum. I should have to work on my powers of intimidation, if I could no longer get a reaction from him.

"Cummings, leave that report here and don't file it into any other channel. And not a word to anyone about the body this morning, either," Lestrade hissed, shoving the papers into the abomination he called a filing system.

"Right, Inspector. And if there's any more reports –"

"Let's hope there won't be any more, but if they do come in, snatch them up before one of those idiots out there gets them. Dismissed, Cummings. Get back to your duties."

"Yes, sir. Morning, Doctor. I'm really sorry, Mr. Holmes –"

"_Cummings_!"

"Yes, sir." The young constable gulped and scuttled out of the office, shutting the door behind him.

All this time I had been pondering whole weird affair…once again, my instincts told me there was far more to the puzzle than just someone wanting my attention (for there were certainly a plethora of easier way to obtain it!). The crimes had ranged from a brutal and violent murder to now a purse-snatching? Was there no middle ground here?

"Mr. Holmes, now you've _got_ to get to the bottom of this," Lestrade said suddenly, slamming his hand down on the desktop and sending a teacup rattling and the rather repulsive-looking green matter inside sloshing around sluggishly. "I can only keep this stuff secret for so long, you know, and this could get very ugly very quickly."

That fellow did have a most annoyingly dependable habit of stating the obvious as if it were spectacular and no one else had ever thought of it.

"Does that report give a description of the purse-snatcher?" I demanded irritably.

He turned and riffled through the stack of papers once more, and I noticed with some amusement that actually my own Baker Street filing system (despite Watson's insults to the contrary) looked like the British Museum's impeccable library cataloguing compared next to Lestrade's haphazard shelving.

"Mmm…ah, here it is. Short fellow, youngish, wiry, dark suit and bowler. Woman's half-blind, so even that bit may not be accurate," the detective growled, slapping the file down on the desk. "Pinched the purse, took off running, and then scrambled up over a low wall. Purse was found in a wastebin around the corner in an alley, sticking half-out of the bin."

Short and wiry…young and agile enough to scale a low wall quickly…and the method of returning the purses to the area in question in wastebins, minus the valuables they contained…that sounded suspiciously like the work of one Charles Lofton.

I had had only one real run-in with the man in question, back in the summer of 1894 when, shortly after my return to life and London, Lofton had attempted and nearly succeeded in organizing over half of the London pickpockets into one giant gang complete with a hierarchy (headed by himself) and headquarters – an attempt which I had made a priority to stop in short order, as the gang would have taken over the entire petty underworld population.

Lofton himself had never been caught on anything other than suspicion, and rather than investing my time in trying to pin something on a petty thief I had instead formed a truce with him, agreeing to lay off him and his cohorts if the gang was dissolved, and made a valuable contact, part of the network comprised of other various men and women I had scattered through the London population (such was Shinwell Johnson and others I often employed in various guises).

Why Lofton might have a motive in getting my attention with a purse-snatching was entirely beyond me, however, and murder (and that odd and grotesque a murder) was most definitely not a component of his usual _modus operandi_.

It did, however, give me a valuable starting point, and start an investigation I certainly would.

I realised I had been staring a hole through the floorboards when I glanced up to see Watson looking at me with a quizzical expression.

"Charles Lofton," I told him by way of explanation.

A look of surprise flitted across his face briefly before it reverted back to questioning. "You're certain of that?"

"The method is the same – Lofton targets elderly or infirm women and waits until they are near a wall or fence over which they are of course unable to climb, and then he strikes and is up and away before the hue and cry is even raised," I replied, standing and buttoning my coat.

"Who?" Lestrade asked blankly.

"Never mind, Lestrade. I'll inform you of fresh developments as soon as they occur, if you will be good enough to return the favour? Come along, Watson."

We were forced to open our umbrellas and stagger through the pouring rain (typical of London's weather, it had decided fifteen minutes of sunshine was more than our daily ration would sanction) when we exited the Yard, as every mode of transport on the street was occupied by a lucky pedestrian. I made a stop on the next block to compose and send a telegram to Lofton, telling him I'd a question for him and I would meet him in the usual place in an hour.

We then beat a hasty retreat to the small café in question on the other side of the river, soaked through and in rather ill tempers. I ordered a late breakfast, the investigation of this morning having given me an enormous appetite. Watson looked askance at my voracious devouring of my meal while he sipped his tea.

"I can't believe you're hungry after seeing that mutilated body in the morgue," he muttered, mixing more milk into the tea.

"I neglected to have breakfast," I explained, finishing off my eggs.

"And luncheon and dinner yesterday," he agreed finally, leaning back to stare out the window at the river of water pouring from the gutters, making a grey-brown rivulet on the glass in his line of vision.

"Do you really think Lofton is involved, Holmes? I mean, I've met the man as well, and he didn't strike me as the type that would murder in any case, and certainly not the type to draw unwarranted attention to himself," he said with a thoughtful frown.

"I agree entirely," I replied, pouring myself another cup of coffee. "But he is the only link I might have at the moment. And if he is not involved, chances are he will know of someone in the cut-purse industry who might have a grudge against me. Ah, that looks like our man now. Be wary, Watson; you can never trust these types," I finished in an undertone, nodding toward a smallish, wiry fellow in his late twenties, clad in dark brown tweed and holding a brown bowler in his hand.

Lofton's dark eyes glanced appraisingly over the crowd in search of my face, and I drummed my fingers impatiently on the table in waiting for his notice, for to draw the attention of the shady patrons of the place would not be profitable or safe for either of us.

Watson managed to do it for me, however, by sneezing so loudly that the occupants of the next table glared at us briefly before rolling their eyes and turning back to their coffee. I sighed and Watson gulped uneasily, but I saw Lofton's thin lips twitch and a moment later he approached and took the chair next to mine without asking for an invitation.

"I have to say, you'd better make this worth my while, Holmes," he said in an undertone, nodding in greeting to Watson across the table. "You didn't give me much time to get here, you know."

"I should think an hour would be plenty of time to get here from Swindon Street," I replied calmly.

Lofton didn't bat an eyelash. "I've not been in that part of the city in probably three days. Much better pickings in the West End, if you know what I mean."

"The splashes of dark grey mud on your trouser cuffs tell me otherwise, Lofton," I said with a smirk, sipping my coffee.

The man started instinctively to glance at his footwear before straightening up and grinning. "I took a cab, Holmes, and cleaned them on the way; and besides, with this much rain blanketing the city and diluting everything, you can't make an accurate analysis of mudstains. You'll have to do a better job of bluffing than that if you want an old dodger like me to fall for it."

Point for Lofton. I sized the man up for a moment while he helped himself to Watson's pot of tea. Watson shoved the milk pitcher over to him before hastily turning away to bury another sneeze in his handkerchief.

"You should be drinkin' chamomile, not orange pekoe," Lofton said helpfully.

"Lofton…" I warned with a not very patient sigh.

"All right, Holmes, keep your shirt on. I suppose you're wantin' to know about that Swindon Street pinch?"

"Brilliant, Lofton. You're scintillating today."

"There's no call to be sarcastic, Holmes. I could just walk out of here and not help you at all, and with pleasure," the man said dryly, leaning back in his chair and glancing from me to Watson, who was trying to suppress a smirk at the man's impertinence.

"You really should keep better track of your calling cards, Holmes."

"Will you just answer the question?" I hissed in exasperation.

"How much is it worth to you?"

"The usual, no more."

"No deal, then. I've lost a good two hours of business between travel and meeting time comin' here, and if you're not going to pay back for that I'm not telling you a thing," Lofton retorted with a scowl.

"Fine," I growled, "Three pounds, no more."

"Five, I had to pay for a cab all the way from the first safe house."

"Three and a half, the cab was not my decision – you could have walked."

"Not and made it here on time. And if I'd walked, I'd be soundin' hoarser than the Doctor here. Make it four, and that's the final deal, Holmes."

"I'll hear the information first, then decide."

"No, you won't. My word, Doctor, is he always this stubborn?" Lofton asked in a confidential _sotto voce_.

"Yes," Watson answered dryly.

"Three now, the rest after I hear your information," I growled, not appreciating the man's attempts to ingratiate himself with Watson.

"Fine," Lofton sighed, running a hand through his slicked hair. "Not much I can tell you, though."

"You've as much as admitted the snatch was done by you. Why."

"It was a job." Lofton shrugged his small shoulders. "Paid me five quid plus whatever I got from the purse if I would make sure the police found it with your cards inside."

"Who hired you?" I demanded through clenched teeth – the man was absolutely infuriating!

"Don't know for certain."

"Don't play games with me, Lofton!"

"I'm serious, Holmes!" The fellow scowled indignantly. "The chap said he was comin' on behalf of another gentleman. When you're in this business, Holmes, you don't ask unnecessary questions. 'Tisn't healthy."

"So he approached you out of the blue? Ever seen him before? Name, description?" I demanded.

"No, never seen him before," Lofton said, draining his teacup. "Tall chap, middle size, small mustache, walking stick and silk cravat - your typical toff."

"Lofton, is that seriously all you have to tell me?"

"Well what do you want of me? He was carryin' a revolver and I don't mess around with that kind of chap," the pickpocket groused irritably.

"Why did you bother coming, if you can't tell me any more than that?" I growled.

"Because if I hadn't, you'd have come to see me – and that's really bad for my men's morale, Holmes. An unofficial cop crawling all over the place tends to frighten away business, y'know?"

"I find it hard to believe you've no idea who this fellow was, Lofton, or who hired him."

"All I can tell you, Holmes, is that he was dressed and talked like a toff. Lightish brown hair, medium coloring, brownish eyes - I couldn't tell because the light was so bad in the joint, Horton forgot to fix the broken gas jets, blast the man… anyway, carried a heavy walking stick and a revolver, like I said. Told me he was asking for the job in place a man who wanted to get the attention of Sherlock Holmes. That's all I can tell you, I swear it on my day's pickings."

I sighed and glanced at Watson, who shrugged helplessly. Then I turned back to the pickpocket, who merely blinked at me.

"Are you aware that a man was murdered – shot, stabbed, _and_ poisoned – this morning and was fished out of the Thames by Scotland Yard, Lofton?"

"Pity," was the man's only comment.

"And the only thing in his pockets was a black calling-card case with six of my calling cards inside it?" I snapped, leaning forward on the table to get my no-nonsense mood across to the careless petty thief.

Lofton's disgustingly chipper mood vanished and his cheerful features suddenly paled. "Murdered…with your cards in his pocket?" he gasped faintly, shooting worried glances back and forth from me to Watson.

The pickpocket's reaction was even better than I had hoped – he obviously knew more than he was telling me.

But he was _going_ to tell me, in very short order.

* * *

_To be continued..._


	4. Chapter 4

"All right, Lofton. Give," I snapped, fixing the pickpocket with a stern gaze that made him squirm in his chair and glance over at Watson for prospective aid.

"I swear, Mr. Holmes, I don't know any more than I told you," he said uncomfortably. "I – just never would've taken the job if I'd known it was connected with a murder!"

He looked again at Watson as if begging him for help in extricating himself from this situation.

"I'm sure you had no idea about the death when you accepted the job, Lofton," my friend said calmly, glaring at me to tell me to back away from the issue.

Not a chance.

"Lofton, you had better be more helpful in tracking down the man who hired you, or I might be forced to turn your name in to Inspector Lestrade. Your reputation for never getting caught on a pinch will be completely ruined," I informed him coolly.

Lofton's dark eyes flashed mirthlessly. "You can't do that without revealing the details of your calling cards to the world, now can you, Mr. Holmes?"

I scowled, but deep down (though I would never admit it) some part of my brain registered that he was right, of course. We were indeed at a stalemate, and I doubted he would be of any further help to me in this investigation.

For a long minute we glared hostilely at each other across the table like two wildcats sizing each other up for a territorial battle. Then Watson unintentionally diffused the tense atmosphere by sneezing again, mumbling a muffled apology through his handkerchief. Lofton jumped and then relaxed slightly.

"I give you my word of honour, Holmes," - here I nearly laughed in his face, for his word of honour was worth no more than the tea leaves at the bottom of his cup - "I've no idea who the man was or where he came from," the young fellow said shortly. "But I could try to find out for you, I suppose. It'll cost you, though."

"Do it," I snapped, fishing in my pocket for the rest of his payment. "And don't try to double-cross me, Lofton. It's not a safe thing to do."

"I could say the same to you, Holmes," Lofton replied menacingly, indicating the unfamiliar faces around us. "I don't stand much for murder, but I've no problem setting a few of the boys to teach you not to threaten me."

Watson's face paled from under his flushed cheeks, and Lofton sent him a reassuring glance before rising from the table, pocketing his bills. "Nothing personal, gentlemen, but I protect myself, you see. Think about it, Holmes. I'll call for you when I've more news."

And with that, the man slapped his bowler back onto his head and melted into the din of the café behind him, disappearing from my sight. I stared moodily after him until Watson coughed.

"He wasn't much help, was he?"

I growled some response and slapped money for the meal on the table. Then I strode out of the café, thoroughly irritated with the infernal young scoundrel's either prevarication or in ability to help me. Though, if he were lying to me, he was doing an exceptionally good job of it.

I put my umbrella up with such force that it nearly flipped upside down, and I found myself frowning darkly at the rain pouring off the awning in the front of the café. The door shut behind me and I heard another cough before Watson's umbrella went up as well.

"Where to now?" he asked, shivering and turning up his collar.

I strode off down the street without waiting for him to catch up, which he did a few moments later. "Back to Baker Street, Watson. I need to smoke and send a few telegrams."

"Are you going to be long?"

"I've no idea in the least, why?"

"I was supposed to stop by and see my patient in Westminster this morning if at all possible," he replied, trying to shield his face from a slosh of water that poured down off another awning to drench us both.

"Go on, then," I said absently, "I think I'll stop by and see Johnson before heading home."

"Who?"

"Shinwell Johnson. He may know something, or know someone who does. There's an empty cab, my dear fellow, best grab it before someone beats you to it."

"Right. I'll be home later," he called, whistling shrilly and dashing to the curb. I kept walking, wanting to clear my head with the exercise and the chill.

Something just was not right about this…

* * *

"I've not heard anything about it, Mr. Holmes, and that's the honest truth," Johnson said thoughtfully, biting the end of his cigar in concentration. "Sure I'd tell you if I had."

"Not even a ripple of someone eager to get my attention?"

"Not even a murmur, Mr. Holmes."

I sighed in despair – what was this person's game? If Shinwell Johnson, who had the entrance of every hell-hole and sin-spot in all of London, knew of no one out for my blood or my attention, then I'd no idea whatsoever who could be behind the affair.

Johnson stubbed out his cigar in the ashtray upon the table, tapping the extinguished end thoughtfully.

"I can't think of anything that would help you, Mr. Holmes," he finally sighed, glancing round us to see that we were not being watched in this rat-hole of a pub.

"Eye and ears open for me, then?" I asked wearily, rising from the table and buttoning my coat.

"Sure thing. I'll drop by first I hear something. Give my regards to the Doctor?"

I nodded mechanically and found my way out into the late afternoon rain. I had spent more time with Johnson than I had intended, and before that had combed a few other places and sent messages to a few other of my regular informants. No one could give me any lead as to who was doing this or why. From what my contacts were telling me, I might as well have been on friendly terms with the entire underworld; no one seemed to have a personal grudge against me at all (no doubt why the crime rate had been so low the last month or so).

I was in a foul mood by the time I reached Baker Street, and that mood only deepened when I saw the occupants of the sitting room.

Watson was offering a glass of brandy to Inspector Lestrade, who had Constable Cummings and (will wonders never cease) Inspector Stanley Hopkins in tow. The latter did not surprise me, as the young Inspector somehow managed to worm his way along whenever possible to see me; for some reason he held some worshipping fascination either with me or my methods, perhaps both. Such adulation was, though flattering and gratifying, occasionally bordering on the excessive and juvenile.

Watson finished the courtesies and collapsed back into his chair, looking quizzically at me. I shook my head and began to warm my hands by the fire.

"Johnson had nothing to offer. I no doubt will regret asking this, Lestrade, but why are you here?"

Watson winced and glanced over at the very uncomfortable-looking trio of Yarders. Lestrade gulped down part of the brandy and stood to look up at me.

"There's been two more, Mr. Holmes," he said warily, no doubt expecting an explosive reaction to his statement. Under normal circumstances I might have been happy to oblige, but at the moment I was ready for any lead I could get in the business.

To think that only this morning I had been lying on that couch, counting carpet fibres in a fit of deep depressive boredom!

"What have my calling cards done now, Lestrade…blackmailed someone?" I asked dryly, sitting in my armchair and drawing my legs up under me.

The little inspector winced and glanced at Hopkins, who was wriggling nervously in his seat on the couch beside Constable Cummings.

"Well, Mr. Holmes," Hopkins began slowly, "I was on duty when this came in, and I thought I had better consult with Inspector Lestrade here before filing the official report. He took one look and brought me immediately round here to you."

"Well, out with it," I said impatiently, beckoning imperiously with my hand as if that would evoke the words faster.

"Well, sir, apparently someone stole a cab from outside a pub whilst the driver went in after his fare, who had had a pint too much for this early in the day," Hopkins said, blushing even as he told of the ridiculous event. "And…when he came out the cab was gone. This does happen fairly regularly, so I of course thought no more about it until we received word that the thing had been found, the horse wandering aimlessly down a path in St. James's Park."

"And a card-case containing six of my calling cards was lying on the driver's seat, is that it?" I asked wearily.

Hopkins nodded solemnly.

"That's not all, Mr. Holmes," Lestrade interjected gravely.

"What now?"

"We've had another body, sir," Hopkins said in a subdued voice.

I stared blankly at the younger man for a moment before turning back to Lestrade, hoping that the Inspector would confirm all my suspicions that Hopkins had indeed gone off the deep end into welcome insanity at long last.

No such luck. Lestrade nodded soberly in agreement with the other.

Blast.

"Empty pockets except for your card case, Mr. Holmes," P.C. Cummings interjected helpfully.

"_Cummings!_"

"Sorry, Inspector…"

I got up to fumble for my pipe uneasily, suddenly wanting the comfort of familiarity between my hands as something tangible to hold onto in this morass of mental intangibility. After I had lit the bowl and drawn a long draught of the smoke, I then turned back to Lestrade, who was biting the end of his pencil in his nervousness and staring morosely at his official notebook.

"Body in the Thames again?" I asked quietly.

"No, sir. This time, a witness says in the wee hours of this morning he heard a scream from an alley in Rotherhithe, ran down the alley, and saw a man lying in a pool of blood, knifed through the heart," the Inspector read dully from the page.

Watson shivered and got up to toss some more coal on the fire.

"You mean to say that someone stabbed this fellow, then took the time to empty his pockets and insert a card-case with my name, while he knew the scream had been heard?" I asked incredulously.

"An awfully cool hand, this chap must be," Cummings ventured.

"Thank you, Constable, for a brilliant observation," Lestrade snapped in annoyance. The poor young officer melted back into his chair, only emerging when Watson sympathetically offered him a cigarette.

"Who was the victim?" I asked, tapping the stem of my pipe absently against my lips.

"One Jacob Chandler," Lestrade read. "Dock worker, the normal rough labourer of that class. Had quite a few enemies and drinking companions, those type always do – every night at least a half-dozen of them kill each other in that district alone."

"I had a beat there when I was a young constable," Hopkins muttered with a shudder. "Thank the saints I was taken off before I'd had to deal with many nights of that kind of brawling."

"Maybe we should put you back on it for a while, bring you back to earth instead of chasing after those fanciful theories of Mr. Holmes's here," Lestrade growled snidely.

I nearly laughed at that, and Cummings gulped back a snicker as the younger inspector's face flushed a deep shade of crimson. I glanced in amusement over at Watson, but he was leant back in his chair with his eyes closed…was he actually dozing?

"Any idea who actually killed him?"

"None. Witness never got a glimpse of him, and he was half-drunk at the time anyway, though he sobered up once he'd slipped in a puddle of blood and fallen on the corpse," Lestrade said absently.

The little official slapped the notebook shut and threw back the last of his brandy, completely oblivious to the other two officers' winces at his callous words.

Even I cringed, and Watson's eyes opened in slight disgust. "Really, Inspector…" he remonstrated mildly.

"Mmph? Oh, right. Well, Mr. Holmes, have you anything to report that will help clear this up? I cannot keep more than one murder out of the papers for very long, you know!" the little man's ferret features were drawn with suppressed nervousness.

I sighed in utter helpless frustration. "Nothing yet, Inspector. I have contacts working to see if they can discover anyone wanting my attention or holding a grudge against me for some reason, but I've nothing helpful come to light yet."

Lestrade cursed roundly, shoving his notebook into his pocket. "From two murders to a purse-snatching and a stolen cab…what the devil is the connection?" he moaned dismally, looking sadly at the two of us in a manner resembling a mournful hound.

"The card-case?" Cummings suggested brightly.

Lestrade sent his underling a look that I daresay curdled the milk in the pitcher upon the table, and the unfortunate constable hastily opened the door for the departing Inspectors.

"I'm going to have to ask you to make some headway in this case, Mr. Holmes," Lestrade said before leaving. "I cannot keep this from getting out for too long. I need answers within twenty-four hours."

"You shall have them, Inspector," I snapped irritably – though I'd no idea in the world how I was going to get said answers.

* * *

_To be continued..._


	5. Chapter 5

For what I assume was hours after the Scotland Yarders left the sitting room, I remained in my chair, smoking furiously and trying to make headway in this most extraordinary case. At some point in the evening I vaguely heard Mrs. Hudson asking if we would be wanting dinner, to which I waved impatiently and Watson murmured a decline, thanking the good lady for her trouble.

She squawked something or other about our not eating regular meals and fussed over Watson's cough, insisting she would bring up a pot of chamomile tea, etc., etc., but I barely heard her or Watson's protests, so involved was my mind in its own intricacies, trying to wrest the threads of the problem into all weaving together.

There simply was not enough data to draw conclusions! I refilled my pipe and drew my legs up once more, locking my fingers on the other side of my knees and closing my eyes, immersing myself in the formidable abyss that was my mind and oblivious to all else for a time.

It was, I thought with a small smirk of rueful amusement, thoroughly incongruous that I had been lying on the settee only this morning, bemoaning the dearth of originality in the criminal realm and wishing more than anything in the world for someone of brains to test my skill against. Now, my unseen opponent was teasing me, testing my mettle, and heaven knew where he would strike next. How was I to go about finding him?

I supposed I could attempt to locate the printer of those calling cards, though I doubted the task would be easy. Honestly, businesses these days…one would think that a man ordering cards for a famous personage would be checked out before they would be printed!

That was a good point, actually. Surely someone would have wondered at Sherlock Holmes having someone else order his calling cards for him?

Or perhaps, as Watson occasionally was fond of pointing out, perhaps I believed myself to be more famous than I really was, and no one knew of me or cared in this instance. Bah. Humanity as a whole was remarkably stupid.

Since I was getting nowhere fast with that train of thought, I cast back slowly in my mind to the beginning of the case this very morning, scanning and re-scanning every detail with a fine-toothed comb in my mind.

Very well, then. The beginning.

Lestrade had arrived with the news that a man had only just been fished out of the Thames not a half-hour before, and that the fellow had been stabbed, shot, strangled, and poisoned. He had gotten the call within the first ten minutes of going on duty, and after fishing the body out had come straight round to Baker Street…

…wait…

If he had gotten to the Embankment fifteen minutes after going on duty, and then had made it here less than a half hour later…

And if, as Watson corroborated, there were no external signs to indicate the man had been poisoned…

That meant less than fifteen minutes had elapsed between fishing the body out and hailing a cab for Baker Street…

No external signs of poison…

A five minute ride to the Yard (at the least) left ten remaining minutes (at most) after the body would have arrived…

The necessary paperwork would have taken that long at least…

No visible signs of poison…

Certainly no time for an autopsy in the five or so minutes unaccounted for…

_Which meant that_ _there was no possible way that Lestrade could have_ _known_ _the body had been poisoned when he told me it was a half-hour later!_

With the dawning of this sudden realisation came a light bursting into the darkness of my mind. How I loved, longed, and lived for these moments when the euphoria of discovering a loophole or that all-important overlooked clue overtook me in a rush far more enticing and exciting than that of the cocaine-bottle!

"Watson!" I fairly shouted, flinging my cramped legs out of my chair to stretch for an instant.

Apparently he had dozed off in his armchair, pulled up close to the fire with his feet outstretched, for he jumped in startlement at my enthusiastic cry.

"Wh-what is it, Holmes?" he mumbled, rubbing his eyes slowly.

"I've found a hole in Lestrade's story – listen to this, old fellow!" I paced back and forth in front of the fire excitedly whilst I detailed the outline of my thought processes to him in rapid staccato bursts, so completely ecstatic was I at finding a lead at last that the words spilled from my mouth in a flood.

When I had finished, I whirled about to face him, expecting that grin of admiration and excitement that so often adorned his face after hearing of some breakthrough on a case.

Instead, I was surprised to see his face flushed, either from the fire or his bout of coughing or something else, and then a blank stare was directed at me.

"Is it not clear to you, Watson?" I demanded impatiently, going for my coat.

"Well…yes, Holmes…it makes sense…" he broke off to sneeze suddenly and then glanced back up at me, some lurking worry hidden in the back of his eyes. "But…you don't suspect Lestrade of tampering with evidence, do you?"

"Not at the moment, no," I replied, retrieving my hat and stick. "I am certain there is a logical explanation for it all, perhaps a body mix-up – but that would be an all-important clue. I'm going to go see Johnson and give him the murdered man's description – if he was dispatched in the last forty-eight hours in that peculiar manner Johnson will be sure to have _something_ on him. Then I shall go and confront Lestrade with what I know. Come along, old fellow, we've work to do!"

So excited was I that I did not notice until he coughed again how very flushed his face really was…perhaps that cold was worsening.

It must have been, for he looked pleadingly up at me. "If you're not going anywhere dangerous, would you mind terribly if I just stayed home tonight?" he asked hoarsely.

I frowned, the voice of my conscience pricking me, quite hard, for not noticing before now how perfectly miserable he looked.

"Of course, my dear fellow," I made a special effort to make my voice more gentle than I was accustomed to being. I probably was completely unsuccessful due to a lack of practise, but regardless he slumped back with a relieved sigh and a murmured word of thanks before closing his eyes once more.

I shut the door softly and then bolted down the stairs to the street, whistling shrilly for a cab as I burst out the door in my excitement.

Johnson was thoroughly intrigued by the description of the dead man (once I had finally chased him down an hour later) and promised to find out within twenty-four hours who he was and why he was killed, if the information were to be found anywhere in the London criminal fraternity.

After thanking the fellow I went on to Scotland Yard, to straighten out the mess with the times regarding the dead man. The sergeant on duty at the Yard at this hour was half-asleep himself and doubtless ready to go off-duty; he gave me only a cursory nod and motioned me back towards the office wing without question. I must remember to speak to Lestrade about the lack of security here…were I an assassin it would be only too easy to get in here this late at night disguised as Sherlock Holmes and murder anyone I so chose.

Not an altogether unpleasant hypothesis, actually…

The light was on in Lestrade's office. Good, he was still in then. I grinned in anticipation of confronting the little man with what I had found about his time discrepancies (a chance to make an official squirm was always thoroughly enjoyable)…but then I heard raised voices inside the office and, being a curious (Watson's term for it was _nosy_) individual, I stopped to listen with interest.

"How could you have made such a colossal blunder in the time, Lestrade!" a low-pitched, hoarse voice hissed.

"Doctor, I swear I didn't think about it until you just said it! How was I to know he'd picked up on the time difference?" That was definitely Lestrade's baritone, raised into more a tenor now with rampant panic.

Wait…

"Inspector…"

"Shut _up_, Cummings. What am I going to _do_, Doctor?"

"You'd better be thinking deucedly quickly, Lestrade – I've got to get out of here as he's due here any minute to confront you with it!"

Surely not…I would not believe it…

"You can't leave it in my lap, Doctor!"

"I did my part, and you blundered yours, Lestrade. What are you wanting _me_ to do about it?"

Surely, surely not…

Suddenly the last remaining pieces of this extraordinary puzzle fell neatly – far, far too neatly – into place, and with them a cold burning fury swept through my mind, destroying the previous thrill of finding what I had thought to be a key component in the drama.

I'd been had. The entire affair had been a hoax for my benefit.

I turned the knob, nearly taking it off the wood in the sudden bitter anger that surged through my veins, and flung the door open to let it slam against the wall.

The four occupants of the room sprang up in surprise and consternation, staring at me.

"Holmes, I can explain, I swear –" Watson began, his flushed face darkening with high embarrassment.

"I take back all the times I said you were not skillful at deception, Doctor," I shot back on the instant, feeling myself fairly quivering with suppressed anger. "For you had me thoroughly convinced that you were too ill to accompany me an hour ago."

He opened his mouth to say something but then shut it without a word, collapsing miserably back down in his chair with a small moan.

"Mr. Holmes –"

"So, Lestrade. Tell me, where _did_ you get the body that you showed me in the morgue this morning?" I demanded calmly…far too calmly, I knew. I could feel my anger roiling below the surface like a boiling pot with the lid about to blow off from the sheer pressure.

The fact did not bother me in the least.

Lestrade gulped and also sat, very slowly. Cummings and Hopkins followed suit without a word, while I remained standing in the position of advantage, forcing them to look upward at me.

Finally Watson broke the silence, his eyes refusing to meet my gaze.

"The body in the morgue wasn't fished out of the Thames this morning but last night, Holmes. Lestrade went to the Embankment this morning because we knew you'd be able to check his story just by looking at him," he said in a hoarse, low tone. "There was no poison in the man's system; I filled the report you read out myself. He was a gang member who was shot and knifed last night in a brawl over a…woman…in the Whitechapel district."

I took this information in and digested it slowly, and Lestrade glanced warily up at me. "We already had him identified and so on, so no actual police procedures were broken," he offered feebly.

"The description Lofton gave of the man who hired him for the purse-snatching could fit either you or Hopkins," I said to Watson through clenched teeth.

"I did it," he whispered. "Since he knew me by sight. And of course the stationer's never had a second thought about _my_ buying calling cards in your name."

"The cab today?"

"All you had was my word for that, Mr. Holmes," Hopkins said uncomfortably. "There was a cab taken and found, but your cards weren't actually on the seat."

"And the other man killed was just that, a common dockyard knifing, and you made up the story about the cards?"

"Once he'd been processed and identified we emptied his pockets and put your card-case into one in case you wanted to inspect his clothes," Lestrade agreed.

"That's why Lofton looked so shocked when he'd heard of the murder – he thought the entire thing was a joke at my expense – and that's why he kept looking at you when we were talking," I accused Watson, and was meanly glad to see him fidget uneasily before nodding, his eyes downcast.

For a moment there was deathly silence, broken only when Watson coughed into his handkerchief. He finally raised his head to look at me, his eyes over-bright.

"It wasn't supposed to end like this…" he began faintly.

"No, I have no doubt you never intended me to find out this soon. Just how long were you going to lead me on this merry rat-race, hmm? I do hope you enjoyed watching me run in circles and make a complete fool of myself." I realised my voice had taken on a tinge of bitterness and decided to leave before I showed more feeling than I had already.

"Holmes, please –"

"I hope you enjoyed your little joke at my expense, _gentlemen_," I snapped, cutting him off with a sharp motion of my hand…why was it shaking, was I really that angry? "I trust you will not be offended when I wish you all a good night."

Lestrade's mouth opened and closed three times in the moments it took me to fumble angrily for the door-knob, and I ignored both his movements and Watson as he got to his feet and reached out in remonstration, beginning to follow me.

Or tried to; I shut the door before he reached it. Hard.

* * *

_Now, you can't tell me you didn't see that coming! To be concluded..._


	6. Chapter 6

_Again, many thanks to all of you who took the time to cheer me up last week! This was, as I said, never supposed to be this long, but anyway. Conclusion ahoy!_

* * *

For an indeterminable period of time that seemed more like days than minutes or hours, I stalked the city in a blind fury, oblivious to the rain that still drizzled down in as dreary a mood as I was and completely careless as to where I went or ended up.

Finally, when a trickle of water worked its way under my collar and birthed a shiver that traveled the entire length of my spine, I decided to go fume indoors somewhere…but where, at this hour of the night? It was after midnight, and the only places open this time of the night were entirely too raucous and cheerful to be congenial to maintaining anger.

And I most definitely was not about to return to Baker Street.

The booming of Big Ben sounded rather near as it struck the half-hour, and I glanced up in surprise, seeing that my rambles had taken me to Westminster…only a block or two from Whitehall.

And thereby, only a few more blocks to Pall Mall.

Of course; Mycroft would be in such a foul mood after being awakened that he would be powder to my match, fueling my fury even more. And he might even be sympathetic for the way I had been played a fool.

I turned my collar up and set off for his lodgings in Pall Mall.

* * *

"Sherlock, what in the blazes are you doing here at this hour?"

My brother goes to bed without fail at precisely 10:00 each night and is not accustomed to rising outside his habitual 6:04 a.m. sharp; he can be a veritable bear when awoken at any (and every) other time of the day or night. And he looked rather formidable, clad in a black dressing-gown and growling worse than an enraged animal himself.

"Mycroft, I _have_ to talk to you," I snapped brusquely.

He was not amused, not that I had thought he would be.

"Sherlock, _no one_ should be about or even _talking_ in this city at this hour of the morning!" he hissed, shutting the door behind us to keep the sound from waking the other residents of the flat. "Do you have any idea what time it is?"

"I'm sorry, brother, I did not realise it was so late, but this –"

"So late! Early, rather! It is almost one in the morning, Sherlock!"

The time made me realise…I'd no idea…where had the day gone? It seemed only this morning I was lying listlessly on our sofa in Baker Street, performing mathematical calculations in my head to pass the crawling seconds. Now I was caught up in a web of ridiculous red herrings and betrayed trusts.

My brother glared at me for a moment in silence before turning the gas up and collapsing on the closest chair that was sturdy enough to hold his ponderous bulk, motioning me to one across from him.

"It had better be a matter of national importance, Sherlock, to wake me at this ungodly hour. You know I dislike altering my habits!"

I returned his glare darkly, slouching down with a scowl after shedding my wet coat on his spotless linoleum (another reason he hated my visits, for he kept the place in a state of neatness bordering on a mausoleum and I took a childish pleasure in destroying it whenever possible).

"Well, spit it out, Sherlock, I haven't all day! Why the devil are you not home in bed like a decent person?"

I frowned and began to detail the events of the day in the worst possible terms, venting my anger and frustration on him and (I admit it now, to my shame) rather exaggerating certain details.

My brother listened to my pathetic story with a very strange expression on his face, alternating among disbelief, incredulity, what-the-devil-is-that-idiot-blathering-about, and what appeared to be a growing realisation…of what, I had no idea.

When I had finished my ranting and sat back angrily to take part in a glaring match with him, he completely annihilated my foul mood by bursting into a compulsive fit of uproarious laughter that would have woken every inhabitant of the house had they all not been older and even heavier sleepers than he.

Needless to say, I was astounded at his reaction and not a little put out. Nothing can possibly be more frustrating than to be laughed at when one is trying to remain incensed.

"Really, Mycroft," I said severely. "This is hardly the reaction I expected from you over such a serious matter."

"I can't believe he actually pulled that off…" My infernal brother's chortle was barely understandable, and I blinked in disbelief, leaning forward with my elbows on my knees to glare at him.

"What?" I gaped, aghast…did that mean he had prior knowledge of the ghastly business?

My brother sighed, a last fit of hiccoughing laughter running through his obese frame in a disgusting ripple before he subsided into his staid composure at last, the brief fit of insanity over – Jupiter was back in orbit, thank heavens.

"Sit back, Sherlock," he said calmly, his eyes awash with a light of respect that I had not seen in them in quite some time. And, more disconcertingly, I had the distinct feeling that the respect was not directed toward me.

"Mycroft, do not tell me you knew of this beforehand!" I growled, my ire deepening at the web of deception that had been so effectively woven round me by the one man I considered a trustworthy person.

"Of course I knew of it, you dolt," he snapped abruptly. "I even _suggested_ the calling card bit as the easiest – and cheapest – way to ensure it drew your attention."

I felt my jaw grow slack and hit my collar.

"Close your mouth, Sherlock, that is a disgusting habit. Of course the Doctor came to me first – he freely admitted that, when trying to outwit a Holmes, he needed the help of an equally brilliant mind."

"And you helped him plan this – this _farce_," I spat. My own brother! "You took pleasure in making a fool of me –"

"Sherlock, that will be quite enough," my brother growled in a low rumble that rattled the china in the cabinet. "You are acting like a spoilt adolescent instead of a grown man, and I am disgusted and ashamed to call you any relation to me whatsoever. Keep your mouth closed for the duration of what I have to say, or I shall throw you out into the street, is that clear?"

Ever since my brother had made that identical threat when I had accidentally dyed his hair orange in that one horrible experiment in grammar school, I had always known the wisdom of doing what he said despite my pride.

I shut my mouth and sat back, though if he only knew what I was _thinking_…

Mycroft leaned back in his chair, folding his massive arms and looking calmly at me. "The Doctor had to notify me in any case; in the event that the Yard got into some trouble over the juggling of paperwork and the false reports, someone had to be willing to see that any evidence of such was destroyed – he would not let the men there suffer just to perform this for you, Sherlock."

"You…destroy Scotland Yard evidence?" I asked feebly.

I received the you-are-such-an-idiot-Sherlock eyeroll. "Who do you think destroyed the police reports that you and the Doctor had burgled Lord Murdle's estate last spring? You know the charges were dropped, but do you know how and why?"

I blinked, realisation dawning on me again for the second time that night.

"The Yard does only what Whitehall allows it to, Sherlock," my brother sighed impatiently with a wave of a fat hand. "I had to be notified and promised to take care of matters should they get out of hand. I am pleased that they did not; I really have not the time to bother with you at the moment. No offense meant, brother."

"So you were privy to the deception the entire time? How could you, Mycroft! I've been made an absolute fool of!" I snapped angrily, slamming my hand down on the side table.

"Honestly, Sherlock. I've never met a man so absolutely _selfish_ as you are," my brother hissed in a fury I had only rarely seen.

I bristled, and he leant forward to repeat the words.

"You are the most self-centred individual in the country, without question!" he shot at me with that glare that could send ambassadors and dignitaries scurrying to do his bidding.

"You have a friend who, not as a Doctor, but as a friend, actually _cares_ for you, though I cannot for the life of me understand why," Mycroft snapped. "And when he came to me yesterday, worried half to death about you and not well himself, telling me he was actually fearing for your sanity or permanent damage to your health due to your depression the last few weeks, I was more than happy to aid him in a plot – _any_ plot, however simplistic – to try to yank you out of your selfish little dream-world."

"I have had fits of depression before, Mycroft, and you both know it!" I growled.

"Not like this one, and not as deep, and _you_ know _that_, brother," he replied severely.

"It's just another of his ruses to make a point about my cocaine," I growled with a curse, wanting to throw something large and preferably sharp-cornered at my brother's insufferable head for his superiority. Why could Watson not leave well enough alone?

My brother's eyes softened in a sad sort of despair, and he shook his head. "This is not about seeing you off that infernal drug, Sherlock, though I wish to heaven you would allow him to help you with that as well. This is about wanting you to be happy."

Happy. Bah. The only time I was truly happy was when…

…when I was investigating a puzzle worthy enough to tax my brain…

Like a bucket of cold water over my burning, roiling anger, the knowledge that I had so badly over-reacted suddenly doused everything in its sickening plunge. I had not been deceived as a joke, a prank, but as an attempt to engage my attention when all else had failed over the last fortnight…

Watson knew what made me the happiest; and since he obviously could not actually commit crimes himself to give me that, he had done the next best thing and simulated them – no doubt just trying to bring me some enjoyment for as long as the deception could hold out.

Mycroft, annoying as always, read that entire train of thought on my face, and his sober eyes softened a bit. "You know, Sherlock, he did get those three Scotland Yarders to help him as well – they all must genuinely hold you in _some_ sort of regard at least to be willing to go to that trouble for you."

Indeed…

"I warned him not to pick anyone he was not sure could be trusted," Mycroft remarked, leaning back in his chair comfortably. "He mentioned something about knowing the right men for the job, I agreed to cover their tracks if it came to it, and he left. I knew no more about it until you told me just now – but you have to admit it was a rather good plan, Sherlock."

I nodded slowly, reluctantly. Too good, actually…I would have carried the investigation on for quite a bit longer had Lestrade not accidentally messed up the time differences.

My brother's voice dropped its stern tone into a softer one as he went on.

"Someday, brother mine, you must realise that there really is more to life than your petty problems."

The last little bit of inflammatory anger suddenly left me deflated and unhappy in the knowledge that I had behaved absolutely deplorably to a group of men whom I actually should have been thanking for a gallant, if somewhat insufficient, effort to rouse me from my boredom and depression.

My first order of business in the morning would be to call upon three rather (atypically) decent specimens of the Yard's constabulary.

And tonight…

My elder brother looked at me, and his eyes softened even more from their usual icy gleam. "I believe you should be heading home now, Sherlock. And you might check on the Doctor, brother, he did look a bit peaked when he was here this morning."

I nodded mechanically, picking my coat up from the floor with a wave of remorse for my atrocious conduct. I owed Watson an apology for my churlish behaviour, and by heaven I would give him one if I had to choke my pride down the entire way back to Baker Street to do so…which very likely was what I would have to do.

Mycroft's large face creased in an even larger smile as he let me out. I barely registered the words he said in parting, my mind already traveling the path back to my flat.

In retrospect, I do hope that I thanked him…

* * *

I jumped out of the cab and tossed the driver the fare and a tip, very grateful indeed that I had found a vehicle before leaving the Whitehall district, for the weather was simply miserable. Warm rain was almost more annoying than cold rain, in my opinion, because it first gave the illusion of pleasantness and then quickly spiraled downward into a soaking freezing chill that bit to the bone.

I unlatched the door and let myself in, hanging my sopping coat in the hall quietly so as not to awaken Mrs. Hudson. As I neared the top of the stairs, I could see from the flickering light under the sitting room door that the fire was still burning, and so I noiselessly opened the door and stepped in, stopping with a sigh of remorse at the sight that met me.

Watson was fast asleep on the couch I had been sprawled upon earlier (though it had been pulled as close to the fire as it could get without being singed), an afghan haphazardly twisted round his legs. But atop of the newspapers I had left littering the floor lay a journal, a dulled pencil, a thermometer, and a bottle and spoon with a sticky residue adhering to the bowl. I frowned in remorse and picked up the bottle to read the label, noticing that my friend's breathing was rather hoarse and heavy.

He had been dosing himself with a tonic. I glanced at his face, which was rather flushed and not from the fire, either. A small damp washrag lay beside his head on the couch, no doubt having slid off when he moved in his sleep.

He had been waiting up for me to return but had finally succumbed to slumber when I had been so late, the dear chap. When I laid a hand lightly on his forehead and found that he was indeed in a low fever, I noted with some surprise a very uncomfortable tightening sensation in the vicinity of my chest that must be the rarely (for me) felt one of guilt. And I realised I was far more worried than I should ever admit to a soul.

I remembered the slightly glazed, over-bright look in his eyes before I had left the Yard and suddenly wanted to kick myself from Baker Street to Euston Station. He had been _ill_, not emotional. But he had left the flat hoping to reach Lestrade in time to prevent my finding out the truth and continuing the performance for a bit longer.

How long had he been feeling thus? I suddenly realised I had absolutely no idea what had been going on around me in this house for the last week or two. I had been so self-centred in my depression that I had not paid attention to anything around me that was actually _important_. Mycroft, much as I hated and refused to admit it, was correct as always – I was being incredibly selfish.

When I withdrew my hand Watson stirred uneasily, a sudden coughing fit overtaking him for a moment before it passed and he took a wheezing breath, unconsciously shivering despite the heat of the blaze.

I hastily piled an enormous amount of coal on the fire and dashed noiselessly into my room to yank the covers off my bed – I would not be needing them tonight, certainly – and then returned to the sitting room to put them over him. I was ridiculously glad to see his shivering cease after a few moments, and only when it had did I replace the cold cloth on his head.

When I did so, he murmured something unintelligible, turning his head, and then his eyes flickered open slowly, fever-bright and glinting in the glow from the fire. I mentally called myself every name in the book for what I had said earlier…was the damage reparable?

He blinked sleepily for a moment before his eyes fastened upon my face, which I hoped conveyed the deep worry gnawing at my conscience.

It must not have, for he frowned and struggled to sit up before I pushed him gently back down, noting with another twinge of worry that he did not even attempt to fight my hand. That did not stop his speaking, however.

"Tried to wait up for you," he said hoarsely, obviously making a polite effort to not cough in my face. "I – wanted to apologise…"

"No, my dear Watson," I said softly, steeling myself for what I was about to – what I _had_ to – say; I did not make a regular habit of apologising for my actions and it never failed to grate on my nerves more even than a policeman's plodding slowness on a case. But…this was one instance where it had to be done; he deserved that much from me at least after his efforts.

"You've nothing to apologise for, Watson; rather I do. I…I am very sorry, old friend, for reacting so selfishly to your trying to help me."

I breathed a sigh of relief and felt the perspiration of nervousness (or from the inferno I had rather stupidly just created in our fireplace) trickle down my neck and hit my collar. I had said the rehearsed words – rehearsed the entire way back in the cab, I might add – and it was over with, thank heaven.

Perhaps I should make a habit of regularly apologising for things…it gave one a rather good, almost…_clean_…feeling inside. Strange, very strange…but not altogether unpleasant. I filed that interesting fact away for later; I had more pressing matters to attend to here.

My friend was about to answer me when his face contorted and his hand clenched. I reached out in concern, but he waved me hastily away, turning his head against the back of the couch and sneezing violently three times in succession.

I tried not to laugh at the petulant face he pulled when he turned back towards me. I reached out to pull the blankets up further round him as he shivered, letting my hand rest on his shoulder for a moment in a rare gesture – and one I should never have made had I not thought he was half-drugged with cough syrup and not quite aware of what was going on around him at the moment.

"How high is your fever?" I asked softly. Did I need to call another doctor?

He shook his head with a grimace. "Not very, just enough to be annoying. Been hovering under 100 all afternoon," he whispered hoarsely.

All afternoon…and I had been completely oblivious. Powers of observation, indeed. "Do you need anything?"

He sneezed again, sending me a very I-am-not-amused glare when I threw up my arms and ducked for cover in mock panic.

"You are _horrid_," he muttered grumpily, burrowing down under the blankets with a childish scowl.

I chuckled, feeling the tense worry lessen and lighten in my heart at the return of his sense of humour.

"No, I don't need anything," he muttered with a faint grin, closing his eyes again. "Thank you, Holmes."

I wanted to return the gesture of gratitude, for it was _I_ who should have been far more grateful than I was…but somehow I could not bring myself to say more than I already had. Whether from pride or stubbornness, I did not know, but apologising had apparently been my limit tonight and my tongue would not form the words I wanted to say but could not.

I frowned and watched until his breathing had grown slow and steady once more. Then I crouched wearily and began to pick up the items scattered on the floor, placing the thermometer and tonic bottle into the open black physician's bag that lay beside the couch.

As I lifted the well-loved journal from the carpet, the pencil fell from where it had been marking the page bearing the freshest writing, and when my name caught my eye I began to skim the paragraphs of clear, firm hand, slightly shaky due to the chill he had obviously caught in his excursions to set up this drama for my benefit.

_Holmes found out tonight, _it read. _Neither Lestrade, Hopkins, nor I had caught onto the time difference in Lestrade's story of the first body found. Holmes always did say I had no natural turn for deception, and obviously that is quite correct._

_He was angry, very angry. I cannot blame him, but actually I should far rather he be angry than in the midst of a depressive darkness as he has been for the past three weeks. Better he explodes in my direction, much better that he does whatever he should like to me, than to destroy himself with that infernal drug and the horror of a mind gone mad with inactivity._

_He probably is running about the city now, hurt and angry…I do hope he remembered his umbrella for the rain is simply terrible…If only he would realise this is not about the drug, though I do wish he would allow me to at least attempt to help him with his dependency. _

_I would not care what it took to banish that dismal, empty look from his eyes that has been there for weeks now, I would do anything for him were it in my power. He simply does not understand that seeing him in that dark state is nearly as painful to me as it is to him. Holmes might be killing his brain cells slowly with that drug, but it is killing me much more slowly, and far more painfully._

_And I can do nothing, as is evidenced by my single attempt and my consequential failure tonight. Helplessness is an even worse feeling than failure, I rather think. Both together are nigh on unbearable._

I closed my eyes and the journal at the same time, remaining in that kneeling position for an undetermined few moments before gently replacing the book beside him on the floor, feeling as if I had just trespassed into a private estate – only accompanied by far more guilt than usual on one such of those ventures.

As I carefully placed the pencil back into the proper page, my eyes fell upon the syringe and cocaine-bottle that I had hidden from view under the couch upon Lestrade's arrival the morning before.

And two more items went into Watson's bag that night before I snapped, and _locked_, it.

Then I tucked a stray corner of the coverlet under his elbow where it had fallen down and reached for my oldest clay pipe.

No. I set the pipe back. He was having enough trouble breathing and coughing without my aggravating it.

I went to the window and lifted my Stradivarius from its case instead, running a finger over its lovely finish before lifting it gently to my shoulder. I had a good deal of very heavy thinking to do on a problem that I found myself, for the first time in a very long time, completely at a loss to unravel or begin to explain.

And I would not be needing aught else than my music and my mind for the rest of the night at least.

For with friends like this remarkable man who, for some unknown reason, had decided I was worth wasting affection on, who needed any artificial means of banishing depression?

* * *

_Ha, you thought it was going to be "...then who needs enemies?," didn't you? _:)

_Finis._


End file.
